By Bob Bindschadler 1 December — I write this on the flight from Christchurch, New Zealand to The Ice. We are on an Air Force C-17, a monstrously large aircraft for transporting monstrously large amounts of cargo. In the old days, scientists and contractors traveling to the ice were treated much the same as cargo, […]
By Bob Bindschadler Christchurch (New Zealand), 29 November — I realized as the moment approached to get in the car and head for the airport that I have been mentally drifting south over the past couple of days. Going over the list of what to pack, then packing, and then mentally running through what I […]
By Bob Bindschadler Greenbelt (MD), 23 November — After years of waiting, our time has finally come. The years have not been empty. There have been hundreds of e-mails, scores of telephone conferences and a handful of face-to-face meetings to iron out the mountain of details required to support more than a dozen scientists’ intent of […]
By Lora Koenig On December 5, we boomeranged to and from the airport. Here is a picture of Ludo and Clem in the inside of Ivan the Terra Bus on our way from McMurdo to the airport, Pegasus Field, for our flight to Byrd. And here is a picture of Ludo and Clem in the […]
By Ludovic Brucker Chers lecteurs francophones (que nous savons nombreux tels que familles, amis, et élèves de Goddard French Immersion Schéol), voici un petit récit résumant notre situation actuelle à Mc Murdo (77 o 51’ S, 166o 40’ E). Lors des prochains messages, nous essayerons d’avoir un court résumé du texte en français. N’hésitez pas à […]
By Lora Koenig It’s Thursday, December 1, and I am, yet again, sitting in our office, waiting. As the saying goes, “hurry up and wait”: This rings true in Antarctica. Last week, we were waiting for our radars to arrive on a plane from Christchurch. Usually there are about three flights a week from Christchurch to […]
By Clement Miege Hello everybody! This is Clement, for my first blog post! Sunday, November 27 was our day off, so we went exploring the surroundings of McMurdo Station. At around noon, Michelle and Lora decided to go cross-country skiing on sea ice while Jessica and Randy went to Scott Base for some shopping at […]
By Michelle Koutnik It has been a busy first week in Antarctica! We planned to stay 10 days at McMurdo station so that we could complete all of our required safety training and prepare all of our food, shelter, and equipment for the traverse. There are many people in McMurdo who support our field research […]
By Lora Koenig It is Sunday night, November 27, and I am sitting in our McMurdo office with Michelle. We had a great Thanksgiving weekend. Here on the Ice we celebrated Thanksgiving on Saturday, November 26, instead of on November 24 (the day it was celebrated in the United States). The reason for this is […]
By Ludovic Brucker Jessica, Randy, and I were scheduled to attend a 2-day Field Safety Training Program (a.k.a. Happy Camper survival school — the nickname makes it sound much more fun than its official title!) on Tuesday and Wednesday, 23-24 November. The training includes spending a night outdoors. I heard about the program months ago […]
